A man who avoided jail time for viciously beating a bus driver and his son two years ago will spend two months behind bars because he was a half-hour late for his curfew.
Del Louie was sentenced to 60 days in jail on Tuesday for breaking curfew on March 9. He has already served seven days, having turned himself in a week ago.
Louie was only granted the privilege of curfew in January.
When he was originally sentenced, on April 3 last year, he was given an 18-month conditional sentence that included house arrest.
“There must be repercussions now, Mr. Louie, there must be.”
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Louie pleaded guilty to counts of assault causing bodily harm and assault with a weapon after attacking bus driver Charles Dixon, 55 at the time, shattering his right orbital bone with a sucker punch and then attacking Dixon’s son Aaron, then 24, with a broom handle in February, 2011.
Louie was 21 at the time.
“You made it through almost a year,” the judge said. “It’s a shame you were not able to comply as perfectly as you needed to do.
“If you breach again, there will be extreme consequences.”
Outside the Vancouver provincial court house, Charles Dixon was pleasantly surprised at the 60-day sentence.
“I’m really pleased with the verdict today. I wanted to see more than what I got a year ago and I did,” Dixon said. “It’s somewhat like Christmas Day to me today.
“Jail will give him some time to consider what he’s done to not only myself and my son, but others, too.”
Dixon was referring to a female bus driver in whose face Louie spat in 2009, and to a police officer and a paramedic on whom Louie also spat.
“Enough is enough,” Dixon said.
Louie addressed the court briefly and apologized to the judge.
“You gave me a chance to prove myself and I failed,” he said.
Overall, assaults on bus drivers are down dramatically over the past six years.
Last year there were 116, compared to 242 in 2006, said Peter Arkell, an assault and worksafe prevention specialist with Coast Mountain.
That’s for 3,500 drivers and 800,000 passengers (including SeaBus) daily.
Many of those drivers have experienced Louie boarding without paying his fare, said Don MacLeod, president of CAW local 111, which represents Coast Mountain drivers.
“He just ignores the operator when he boards the coach,” Louie said. “Our operators are of the clear understanding not to engage and get into an assault situation.”
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